College Football Bowl Projections: Week 13
It’s amazing what a difference four weeks can make.
In that span, some teams moved up in the bowl pecking order, others moved down, and some hardly moved at all. Thus, as conference championship weekend looms, the bowl projections look a lot different than they did four weeks ago.
Some notes before this week’s projections: all rankings are from the post-Week 13 College Football Playoff (CFP) committee rankings. Teams are selected based on their regular season records, with any team over .500 eligible for one of 82 slots in 41 bowl games. With 79 eligible teams, one 5-6 team (Buffalo, a heavy home favorite against Akron) and two 5-7 teams based on APR (Rice and UNLV) are included in the projection.
Also, the Bahamas and Hawaii bowls have already confirmed its participants and that is shown in the projection. Only games involving FBS teams are shown here (hence no projection for the Celebration Bowl) and the national championship is not being projected. Here are this week’s bowl projections:
New Year’s Six Bowls:
CFP Semifinal / Peach Bowl (Dec. 31, Atlanta): No. 4 USC versus No. 1 Georgia
CFP Semifinal / Fiesta Bowl (Dec. 31, Glendale, Ariz.): No. 3 TCU versus No. 2 Michigan
Orange Bowl (Dec. 30, Miami Gardens, Fla.): No. 7 Tennessee versus No. 9 Clemson
Sugar Bowl (Dec. 31, New Orleans): No. 10 Kansas State versus No. 6 Alabama
Cotton Bowl Classic (Jan. 2, Arlington, Texas): No. 18 Tulane versus No. 8 Penn State
Rose Bowl Game (Jan. 2, Pasadena, Calif.): No. 5 Ohio State versus No. 11 Utah
The hypothetical CFP semifinals feature Georgia playing a Pac-12 team in Atlanta for the second time this season and a Fiesta Bowl featuring two unbeaten teams. While a Rose Bowl Game rematch is appealing, the game’s organizers could seek to prevent Ohio State and Utah from appearing in the game for two straight years. The other major bowls feature a mix of blue bloods (Alabama, Clemson and Penn State) and ‘new bloods’ (Kansas State, Tennessee and Tulane as the Group of Five’s representative).
Pre-Christmas Bowls: Bahamas to Hawaii
Bahamas Bowl (Dec. 16, Nassau, Bahamas): UAB versus Miami-OH
Cure Bowl (Dec. 16, Orlando, Fla.): Marshall versus Western Kentucky
Fenway Bowl (Dec. 17, Boston): Cincinnati versus Louisville
New Mexico Bowl (Dec. 17, Albuquerque, N.M.): North Texas versus Wyoming
LA Bowl (Dec. 17, Inglewood, Calif.): Boise State versus Washington State
LendingTree Bowl (Dec. 17, Mobile, Ala.): Bowling Green versus Southern Miss
Las Vegas Bowl (Dec. 17, Las Vegas): No. 24 Mississippi State versus No. 15 Oregon State
Frisco Bowl (Dec. 17, Frisco, Texas): Rice versus UNLV
Myrtle Beach Bowl (Dec. 19, Conway, S.C.): UConn versus Georgia Southern
Famous Idaho Potato Bowl (Dec. 20, Boise, Idaho): Eastern Michigan versus Air Force
Boca Raton Bowl (Dec. 20, Boca Raton, Fla.): Louisiana versus Memphis
New Orleans Bowl (Dec. 21, New Orleans): UTSA versus Troy
Armed Forces Bowl (Dec. 22, Fort Worth, Texas): Houston versus Baylor
Independence Bowl (Dec. 23, Shreveport, La.): SMU versus San Jose State
Gasparilla Bowl (Dec. 23, Tampa, Fla.): BYU versus Syracuse
Hawaii Bowl (Dec. 24, Honolulu): Middle Tennessee versus San Diego State
This year’s slate of pre-Christmas bowls offers some quality matchups. The headliner is the Las Vegas Bowl, which features Mississippi State head coach Mike Leach facing a familiar Pac-12 opponent in Oregon State. Four other bowls (the Armed Forces, Fenway, Gasparilla and LA) in this group feature a Power 5 team. Other storylines here include two ten-win teams from smaller conferences meeting in the New Orleans Bowl and UConn making its first postseason appearance since 2015 in the Myrtle Beach Bowl.
Post-Christmas Bowls: Quick Lane to Citrus
Quick Lane Bowl (Dec. 26, Detroit): Buffalo versus Liberty
Camellia Bowl (Dec. 27, Montgomery, Ala.): Ohio versus South Alabama
Birmingham Bowl (Dec. 27, Birmingham, Ala.): No. 22 UCF versus Florida
First Responder Bowl (Dec. 27, Dallas): Coastal Carolina versus Fresno State
Guaranteed Rate Bowl (Dec. 27, Phoenix): Wisconsin versus Oklahoma
Military Bowl (Dec. 28, Annapolis, Md.): East Carolina versus Wake Forest
Liberty Bowl (Dec. 28, Memphis, Tenn.): Kansas versus Missouri
Holiday Bowl (Dec. 28, San Diego): No. 13 Florida State versus No. 16 Oregon
Texas Bowl (Dec. 28, Houston): Texas Tech versus Arkansas
Pinstripe Bowl (Dec. 29, New York): Duke versus Iowa
Cheez-It Bowl (Dec. 29, Orlando, Fla.): Pittsburgh versus Oklahoma State
Alamo Bowl (Dec. 29, San Antonio): No. 20 Texas versus No. 12 Washington
Duke’s Mayo Bowl (Dec. 30, Charlotte, N.C.): Maryland versus No. 25 North Carolina State
Sun Bowl (Dec. 30, El Paso, Texas): No. 23 North Carolina versus No. 17 UCLA
Gator Bowl (Dec. 30, Jacksonville, Fla.): No. 21 Notre Dame versus No. 19 South Carolina
Arizona Bowl (Dec. 30, Tucson, Ariz.): Toledo versus Utah State
Music City Bowl (Dec. 31, Nashville, Tenn.): Minnesota versus Ole Miss
ReliaQuest Bowl (Jan. 2, Tampa, Fla.): Illinois versus Kentucky
Citrus Bowl (Jan. 2, Orlando, Fla.): Purdue versus No. 14 LSU
Among the bowls played after Christmas, four pit two ranked teams against each other. One of those games is the Alamo Bowl, where each team has a transfer starting at quarterback. In addition, the Sun Bowl features a pair of schools known for basketball enjoying success on the gridiron, while the Holiday and Gator bowls feature red-hot Florida State and South Carolina, respectively. Of the remaining bowls in this grouping, three (Duke’s Mayo, Liberty and Texas) see old conference foes meeting again, while the Birmingham Bowl offers a rematch of last year’s Gasparilla Bowl, which saw UCF defeat Florida.
Will Duerksen is a junior majoring in broadcast journalism. To contact him, email wdd5066@psu.edu.
